by Rob Cottingham | Sep 16, 2014 | Uncategorized
trekkiefeminist:
I decided to watch and review “The Apple” after it was mentioned as an episode chock-full of red shirt deaths on a super-fun episode of All Things Trek featuring the creators of The Red Shirt Diaries.
“The Apple” does not have a complicated plot, so I won’t spend a lot of time on that. Basically:
- Away team beams down to Eden-esque planet, and makes sure you know how Eden-esque it is. Chekov is excited to spend time with his gf, Yeoman Martha Landon
- Four redshirts die after being attacked by trick flowers and comically exploding rocks.
- Away team meets “primitive” people festooned in plastic but non-attacking flowers and redface makeup, finds they are worshipping papier mache high school art project monster named Vaal
- Away team finds Vaal is a computer that is keeping the people on the planet immortal but also forbidding them from love/sex
- Away team + Enterprise kill Vaal because Kirk thinks people should not live in ignorance, despite Spock’s concerns about the Prime Directive
- Kirk and McCoy joke that Spock kinda looks like Satan.
- The End
Some parts of “The Apple” work better than others. Let’s start with the others.
Read More
Awesome: “Really? I mean, as a union activist, I’m all for giving people the right to refuse unsafe work, but it doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense in Starfleet.”
by Rob Cottingham | Sep 16, 2014 | Speechwriting
Inspiring speeches don’t just persuade people of a point of view; they urge the audience to action, and show them how that action will produce meaningful progress toward a better world. Here’s an example. After I tweeted this column by the Vancouver Sun’s Daphne Bramham (“We need citizens, not just taxpayers and bookkeepers“), Ryan Merkley … Continue reading →
by Rob Cottingham | Sep 14, 2014 | Vancouver
This morning brought the news that municipal party Vision Vancouver’s Twitter following (along with Mayor Gregor Robertson’s) had ballooned overnight, and that most of those followers were fake. What should have been a non-story wasn’t, because... by Rob Cottingham | Sep 12, 2014 | Technology
I was switching to a stalled tab when Firefox quit — but I don’t know if that was the cause. Maybe it’s me. You put so many of your dreams on hold when you become an adult, and every choice you make seems to slaughter a million other possibilities. Click... by Rob Cottingham | Sep 9, 2014 | Everything Else
Another Apple event has come and gone, and this time I decided to try my hand at some high-octane prognosticating. I was less than entirely successful. But unlike some pundits, I’m willing to cop to having a near-100% inaccuracy rate. What I got right Very,...
